Monica's Story: Dawn of the Dead
by 101ideas
Summary: The story of the 2004 horror movie Dawn of the Dead is told through the eyes of one of it's most overlooked main characters, Monica. Monica is the blonde survior who arrives at the mall by the tractor trailer. See the gruesome story unfold from one of horror cinemas most under used character


Her shoulder slammed hard against the inside of the tractor trailer as the truck engaged in another sharp turn, and a needle like pain shot through Monica's side. It was almost completely dark, save for a few cracks in the hull where sunshine was peaking through, and the dying clip flashlight on Glen's keychain, although that didn't help see much except how fucked they all were, and you didn't need much light for that. As she positioned herself upright, Monica wondered if she'd done enough good in her life. She wasn't a church girl by any means, but when you're covered in blood in the back of a dinghy trailer with the undead army chasing you down, the idea of access to heaven sounds more than appealing. After short consideration, Monica decided she had not, she wasn't very good herself. Another religious principle made sense to her now, but it wasn't heaven and hell, it was the idea of karma.

Another sharp turn interrupted Monica's religious epiphany, this time in the opposite direction, which sent her flipping over the wheelbarrow in the center of the trailer, on top of the bloated woman, and straight intro the other side of the trailer. Laying on the floor, Monica couldn't help but despise the fact that they spent an extra few minutes hauling that fatass woman there with them (which Monica had been internally referring to her as in absence of an actual name). In all honesty you couldn't tell her from any other dead body on the ground, the only difference is this one wouldn't stop complaining about her arm, which was sporting a clotted bite wound.

The wind had been thoroughly knocked out of Monica, or what little there was left after being chased down at Saint Berbina, and she was definitely over this day.

"This driving is seriously fucking with my hair!" Monica yelled as she picked herself up from the floor, her golden locks in her eyes obscuring what little she could see before.

"Glen, hun, do I look alright?" She said as she looked towards the dying glow of the flashlight.

Glen pointed the flashlight at Monica's face for a few seconds "I don't think you have any cuts or scrapes"

"No, my makeup, smeared or messed up?"

"Are you serious?"

"Deadly". If it wasn't for the fact that everyone had just witnessed an undead bloodbath, Monica felt like her pun would have been a real killer.

"Yeah, it looks great" Glen responded back, shining the flashlight elsewhere, deciding that the last few minutes it had might find a better use than Monica's makeup light.

"Hey, princess, if you're done using the light to keep your slutty make up in check, maybe you can shut the hell up so we can all think of a plan to survive this" Steve barked at Monica in the douchiest fashion he could. She had known Steve for all of a few hours and already her eyes hurt from rolling every time he spoke.

Monica scrunched her hair up and neatly got her curls to fall back in line. She looked like a mess, her pants were ripped and loose around her waist. The high neck crop top she had only just bought a week ago was ruined, a disgusting bloody bile splattered the stripes like a Jackson Pollock painting. If it wasn't for the fact that it was deadly regurgitation from the belly of an infected, Monica actually thought the top was cuter. She had a pair of light brown UGGs to match her pants, but those were long gone, ripped off by some half eaten corpse, leaving Monica barefoot. The only thing left the same on her was her hair and makeup, and in the chaos of this day, Monica felt like that's all she had control over.

The walkie talkie in Steve's hand crackled to life, with Norma, the driver, urgent on the other end.

"Come in, whoever has the radio needs to answer, now!"

"What do you got for us, Big Papa?" Steve answered back, a sarcastic tone in his voice which Monica began to think was natural.

"There's a mall, up ahead. And there's people, on the roof, I'm not sure what they're doing, but a few look like they're signaling for us. But I gotta warn you, there's a lot of infected around the entrance, and I've hit my fair share just driving around here. I say we stop but there's a good three quarters of a tank of gas left to keep going. It's up to y'all"

"Over and out, Big smokey" Steve took his thumb off the receiver and motioned to all of us.

"My dad really needs help, he's hurt bad" Nicole said, supporting her fathers weight.

"Oh, I'll be fine, just need a lie down eventually, don't want to make any decisions on account of me. Maybe we should keep going, I'll be fine, I promise, but really whatever is best for everyone" Frank, Nicole's father, replied back to the group. Monica looked over at him, a middle aged balding man, slightly pale but she didn't think it was from blood loss, his only mark was a small bite on his right hand, which didn't look nearly as bad as the one the bloated woman had on her arm. The blood from his hand was dripping onto Nicole, disappearing in her Auburn hair. Monica figured she was only around 16, and Frank maybe in his late 40's. Steve was around 30, and Glen must've been pushing 60, along with Norma and Tucker in the front cab. Besides Nicole, Monica was the youngest at 23, and couldn't help but agree with herself and that she was a lot prettier, but that didn't make her dislike Nicole any less. From the brief amount of dialogue the two shared earlier, Nicole reminded Monica of everything she despised in High School, a very nerdy and preppy little girl, she already annoyed Monica.

Glen chimed in "I really don't think we should push our luck any more. I've known the people who go to Saint Berbina for years, and watching most of them bludgeon each other to death and eat each other, I just really don't think this is the time to pick and choose."

He had a point, Monica remembered that some radio jockey had broadcasted that The Church of Saint Berbina, the mega church downtown, was supposed to be a safe haven. Maybe it was at some point, but somewhere along an infected got in, and from there what happened was the same thing that's been happening over the last 24 hours throughout the entirety of the country and the rest of the world, which none of them even knew about.

Steve pointed at him "your fucking church was supposed to be safe and when I got there some undead bitch tried taking a bite out of me, so forgive me if I don't trust your logic".

Although irrational and annoying, Steve also had a point, Saint Berbina was seemingly safe, but out of the hundreds who arrived, only the eight people in this tractor trailer made it out.

The bloated woman groaned in the center, not much of a clear vote.

Eyes fell on Monica to decide the split. She thought for a second, on the one hand, it was a mall, as far as she was concerned, there really wasn't a place she'd rather be stranded during the apocalypse. On the other hand, she trusted Saint Berbina to be safe, and for that she lost one of her favorite pair of boots. Oh, and she was grabbed by one of infected, but in a world where men perved on her 24/7, she was used to it, even if this one had more interest in eating her than fucking her.

Monica wasn't really good at making decisions that involved others, throughout her life she always chose ones that put her first, even if that meant hurting another. She figured it didn't matter now, considering she saw a priests eat a choir boy earlier, good people weren't exactly being spares. It was in Monica's nature to survive, morals be damned. She continues weighing more pros and cons in her head, her life quite literally could depend on this decision.

Monica closed her eyes and shook her head "Just get me out of this fucking truck, now" she huffed.

Steve pressed on the walkie talkie "Norma, come in Norma"

After a brief pause, Norma answered "Steve, we're coming closer to the mall, y'all made a decision"

Steve responded in Faux-trucker slang "That's a 10-4 Smokey, the Bandit is parking at this truck stop for a spell, over and out"

"Alright, here's the plan" Norma began "there's two ladies standing on the roof over the Trailer loading Bay, it looks like they're gonna want us to stop in there instead of trying for one of the main entrances, so I'm sure it's still safe. Now there's quite a few of these things around the mall, but that area is pretty clear for now. We have a lot of them following us, so as soon as we park me and Tucker are gonna climb up from the sunroof, onto the top of the trailer, and meet these people near the fire escape above the bay. I want you folks to hold tight, we will come down and open up the bay door, and open the trailer latch from the outside. Now the radio is bolted into the cab, so once me and Tucker leave we can communicate with you. Once we're on the other side of the door, if you hear three knocks, you'll know it's me, and it'll be safe to come out. If you hear anything else, well, may God be with you."

Steve responded "Oh thanks for the reassurance, captain."

Monica was beginning to doubt her vote. She didn't consider a future where the rest of her life was stuck in this lunch box of a trailer waiting to be some undead's snack. She looked around, and saw the air vent towards the front of the trailer. It was one of the only sources of sunshine. Monica deduced that if they were trapped in here, she could climb up and squeeze her skinny body through there. She was concerned her tits and ass wouldn't fit, but if she had to squeeze into tight skirts and corsets every day for the last 5 years, she most certainly would squeeze through that if her life were on the line.

That's about as far as Monica got with her back up plan before Norma began to speak over the radio. "Alright, now I'm gonna have to pull tight here so we can back up into the bay, y'all hang onto something firm, we're gonna hit that loading bay hard."

Steve responded "Gotcha Papa Bear, Firm and Hard". Steve took his thumb off the walkie talkie and looked over at Monica. "Firm and hard, you'd know a thing or two about that, wouldn't you sweetheart?"

"Fucking bite me, Steve" Monica snapped back.

" _Fucking pig"_ Monica thought to herself. She was beyond trying to be clever and cute in her comebacks like she normally would be, she always had a silver tongue, but the undead apocalypse she woke up to seemed to dilute it a little.

Monica gripped a handle on the side of the trailer, and pressed her body against the wall. Frank gripped the next one down with his good hand, and Nicole locked her hand around his. Glen squatted down and held the back of the wheelbarrow, figuring if it got loose it would act as more of a wrecking ball to the group. Steve sat in the corner of the trailer, formed by the wall and the door, and tucked his head.

The truck screeched to a halt, an invisible force pulling everything to the front of the trailer. Monica barely had the arm strength to hold on, her golden locks flying towards the cab. In an instant gravity seemed to return to normal, and everyone repositioned themselves. The shift in momentum went towards the opposite end of the tractor trailer as the rig began to back up. As Monica gripped onto the wall, she could feel several thumps reverberate throughout the hull, and wondered what exactly they kept hitting. Realizing it was more than likely the bodies of the infected, she felt disgusted. Monica tried not to think about it as the truck began picking up some serious speed as it reversed, almost as fast as it had been out running the infected horde earlier.

The radio crackled to life, "y'all hold on, now!"

As soon as Norma said that, the entire trailer violently came to a stop, hitting a solid structure. Monica's body flung towards the door, what little arm strength she had didn't seem to matter much in the face of several tons of horsepower driven steel slamming into brick. She flew back, hitting Glen on the back of the head with her tumbling body, and rolling up onto the bloated woman in the wheelbarrow, coming to a rest on her massive stomach. The black liquid and dried blood that covered the woman was now all over Monica's right side. The trailer was halted, and for the first time since she was rescued, not moving.

Norma came over the radio again "okay folks, Tucker and I are headed up, hang tight, we'll be as fast as possible"

Monica quickly got off the groaning woman, "Oh fucking gross!" She yelled as she quickly tried to wipe off the excrement from her arm. The woman groaned louder than before, obviously hurt by the 125 lbs. projectile that was Monica slamming into her.

Monica looked at the woman " _Why did we ever pick you up, you look like an infected anyways."_ _Monica Thought "Oh god I hope that stuff doesn't seep into my skin and fuck me up!"_

Nicole and Frank picked themselves up and came rushing over to the bloated woman.

"Ma'am, are you alright?" Nicole squeaked.

Monica replied "Her? What about me? I flew 10 goddamn feet back!"

"Well, you're not exactly injured and-" Nicole leaned over and whispered to Monica "extremely overweight and unhealthy" She said, looking down at the bloated woman.

Monica responded "Which is why we should have left her, instead of endangering the rest of us because you and Frank wanted to play good samaritan!" she yelled, causing an echo through the trailer. The bloated woman groaned but couldn't respond, Monica wasn't even sure she could hear her.

"You're just upset because you lost a stupid pair of boots when running for the trailer that you only just stopped going on about like ten minutes ago!" Nicole fired back

"UGGs, expensive UGGs, I just got, and considering how people are eating each other outside, I can't exactly go and get another pair! And since I don't have shoes, I've been barefoot this whole time!" Monica held up her stinking dirty foot, nails coated with red velvet nail polish, matching her lips. Monica was never a working girl, she didn't have a humble life on a farm and she never enjoyed the outdoors, so this was the dirtiest her dainty feet had ever been.

"Well, good thing we're at a mall then, you self centered evil woman! Oh, and your feet stink too, by the way!" Nicole screamed.

Monica was raising her hand to smack her when Frank spoke up "Ladies, please, please no fighting, we can't afford that right now, we have to figure out how we're gonna survive the day."

As he said that, Gunshots could be heard from outside the trailer, and loud thumps on top. Monica figured that was Tucker and Norma shooting the infected from the top of the trailer, which meant there must be a lot of them. Everyone was silent for a minute, before Monica shook her head and and decided ignoring Nicole was the best course of action.

As Nicole helped her father stumble over the wall to lean him on, Monica looked down at Glen

"Are you alright? I smacked you pretty hard there."

Glen got up and groaned, his old frame hunched over and shorter than Monica's "Yeah I'm fine, smacked against the wheelbarrow, but I'll be alright, no blood. Are you alright?"

"Finally, yes, thank you, I'm fine. I'm so fucking sick of this stupid trailer, though!" Monica huffed, crossing her arms. At the sound of a loud moan behind her, Monica quickly twirled around, her golden curls splashing in front of her face before settling back.

She saw Steve, who before know she was enjoying forgetting was here, groan painfully, his eyes tightly close, gripping the back of his head. On the door behind him a blood smear was left from where his head smacked against it.

Monica walked over and looked down at, Steve was still moaning on the ground, and smirked. Steve could feel her presence and looked up at her.

"Are you an angel?" He said, either out of haziness or sarcasm, perhaps both.

Monica smirked slyly at him "A goddess, actually, and you're still a pig" she said, all the sass and bite of a diamondback rattlesnake. As much as Monica loved to see a man like him wallow in pain, she realized that this wasn't the time or place for it.

She held out a hand and helped him to his feet. Steve sprung up and gripped himself around Monica, her breasts pressing against him from under her top, as one of his hands came around and gripped her bottom for support.

At the very moment, Monica smiled and said seductively "I guarantee if you don't take your hand off me, I'll feed you to a corpse."

There was an odd sadistic underline to her tone that Monica had trained into her speech over the years, and that Steve certainly wasn't prepared for. Shocked, he took his hand off and backed up.

"Wow, cool it sweetheart, just making sure I have control of my motor skills, you know, brain injury" Steve pointed to his head.

"Whatever, don't fucking touch me" Monica's tone goes back to it's sultry, buxom natural state.

At this point, everyone has seemed to steady themselves and quieted down, even the bloated woman has stopped moaning. More gunshots ring out, and the group can hear Norma yelling from the top, although what she's saying is unintelligible.

As the gunshots stop, a loud moan finds its way into the ears of the group, but it isn't from the bloated woman, nor is it from Steve or Frank or any other person in the trailer. As Monica listened, it didn't even sound like a person. The more she listened, the more the moan becomes several moans, dozens of moans.

Nicole let out a slight whimper "Oh god. Daddy, they can't get us can they?"

"No Sweetheart, this thing is solid" Frank's says as he knocks on the side of the trailer with his good hand. "Norma and Tucker are gonna let us out any second" Frank says, but Monica can make out the slight doubt under his voice.

"Oh yeah, Big Rig Norma, and Hillbilly Tucker, exactly the saviors I'm looking for in the zombie apocalypse" Steve says, the bash to the head unaltering his sarcastic personality. Monica wonders how many bashes to the head it might take to change it, and smiles at him. Although she dislikes Steve, she dislikes Nicole and Frank a lot more. But Monica barely knew any of them, as far as she was concerned, what mattered most was her own safety, which always took priority.

Suddenly, however very faint under all the moaning and growling of the undead, Monica could hear voices conversing on the other side of the door, and a very loud rattling, like chains, vibrating through the walls of the trailer.

Glen peaked up, and grabbed the wheelbarrow, pushing it closer to the door. Monica quickly stepped in front of it, assuring she was closest to the door.

"Oh no, I am not going last off this god forsaken trailer, especially considering how long it will take her to get down" Monica protested, as she stood close to the trailer door. Glen shrugged his shoulders, and let Monica pass by. Steve remained by his corner, while Frank and Nicole stepped forward to be closer. Three knocks could be heard on the bottom of the door, and Monica sighed a heavy relief that she wouldn't have to impose her back up plan, after further examining the vent and the dimensions of her own curves, she figures she would've been stuck anyways

Like a group of sailors, crowded around the front of their ship, they looked to the shoreline, and eagerly awaited with curiosity what this new world would be like.

The trailer doors swung open. A bright flood light shined into the trailer, illuminating the group for their new hosts. Monica could see bloodied arms and fingers mashed between the loading Bay and trailer, severed pieces of infected who had been caught between.

This was all she took in before she could see two men point pistols at her

" _Welcome home"_ Monica thought.


End file.
